In the short story “The Bishop” from 1902, the Russian writer Anton Chekhov describes the days and nights of a bishop during Holy Week. The bishop is ill and dying, though at first he does not know this. During the course of the story, he holds services in the Orthodox cathedral, including a four-hour Good Friday reading of lessons from the Gospels; visits a sick woman; hears the concerns of parishioners; and interacts with his colleagues in the monastery. Lying in bed, he recalls different stages of his life in the ministry: the sounds of church bells combined with creaking wheels and bleating sheep in the peasant town where he grew up; his years studying theology at a university; his homesickness for Russia when stationed abroad.
Having an uncle who is an Episcopal Priest, I’m aware of the ways in which Holy Week is like a spiritual decathlon for members of the clergy. It is not only an extraordinary opportunity for meditation on Christ’s death on the Cross, affirmation of foundational Christian theological principles, and fellowship with one’s spiritual community, but also a time in which ministers, deacons, and lay leaders take care of hundreds of details. I remember Easter services in Kentucky with a cross of chicken wire, its slots filled with forsythia. Every year, someone had been responsible for propping up the cross before the service and storing it afterwards. Ministers in churches served by a single clergy member—a common situation in rural areas and small towns like the one I’m from—write and delivery four different sermons on four back-to-back days.
In a few pages, Chekhov’s story renders an entire life spent in the ministry, including mundane aspects of the bishop’s role that frustrate him: “The senior clergy, all over the diocese, were in the habit of awarding good-conduct marks to junior priests, young or old, even to wives and children, and all this had to be discussed, scrutinized and solemnly recorded in official reports.” Yet Chekhov contrasts the bureaucratic obligations that are a part of church ministry with moments of ineffable beauty, such as the scene of parishioners departing from the Palm Sunday service:
Soon the service was over. As the bishop climbed into his carriage,
homeward bound, the whole moonlit garden was overflowing with
the joyful, harmonious ringing of heavy bells. White walls, white
crosses on graves, white birches, dark shadows, the moon high above
the convent—everything seemed to be living a life of its own, beyond
the understanding of man, but close to him nonetheless. It was early
April, and after that mild day it had turned chilly, with a slight frost,
and there was a breath of spring in that soft, cold air. The road from
the convent to the town was sandy and they had to travel at walking pace.
In the bright, tranquil moonlight churchgoers were trudging through
the sand, on both sides of the carriage. They were all silent and deep
in thought; and everything around was so welcoming, young, so near
at hand—the trees, the sky, even the moon—that one wished it would
always be like this.
Before starting the biblical commentary section of this blog entry, I would like to give thanks to readers who are ministers, for all that you do during Holy Week to help your congregations draw closer to God.
John 20: 1-18
This week’s lectionary selection from the Gospel emphasizes the role of Mary Magdalene. In the Gospel of John, she is portrayed as the first person to visit Jesus’ tomb after his crucifixion:
1 Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance. 2So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said, "They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don't know where they have put him!"
Other Gospel accounts of the Resurrection are Matthew 28; Mark 16; and Luke 24. The term “the other disciple, the one Jesus loved,” has been interpreted as the apparent narrator; we first see this description in John 13:23, in the scene when Jesus washes the disciples’ feet. The pronoun “They” could be used to describe grave robbers. However, robbers would not have left the expensive linen used for burial.
3 So Peter and the other disciple started for the tomb. 4Both were running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. 5He bent over and looked in at the strips of linen lying there but did not go in. 6Then Simon Peter, who was behind him, arrived and went into the tomb. He saw the strips of linen lying there, 7as well as the burial cloth that had been around Jesus' head. The cloth was folded up by itself, separate from the linen. 8Finally the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went inside. He saw and believed. 9(They still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.)
Scriptural passages that describe the Resurrection include Luke 24; Acts 2:24-32; and 1 Corinthians 15.4.
10 Then the disciples went back to their homes, 11but Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb 12and saw two angels in white, seated where Jesus' body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot.
13 They asked her, "Woman, why are you crying?"
"They have taken my Lord away," she said, "and I don't know where they have put him." 14 At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus.
It is interesting to note differences between the Gospel accounts of this narrative. Luke describes Mary Magdalene going to the tomb first, but she is in a group of women that includes Mary the mother of James and Joanna. In contrast to the account in John, the group of women is met, not by Jesus, but by two men whose clothing and mysterious appearance indicate that they are angels. Jesus’ first appearance in Luke is to the two men on the way to Emmaus. In the longer version of Mark 16 that includes passages 9-20, Mary Magdalene, described as “the woman from whom he cast out seven demons,” and two other women encounter, not two, but one angel at the tomb; in Mark, Jesus first appears to Mary Magdalene alone. A distinction of Matthew 28 is that Mary Magdalene and “the other Mary” actually get to see an angel forcibly rolling back the stone and sitting on it. Matthew is the only Gospel that includes an earthquake in this scene. The two women tell the disciples; it is not clear whether or not they are still there when Jesus appears. An element that all of the Gospels share is that Mary Magdalene, either alone or in a group, is in the first party to arrive at the tomb. A probable reason would be to anoint the body.
15 "Woman," he said, "why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?"
Thinking he was the gardener, she said, "Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him."
16 Jesus said to her, "Mary."
She turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic, "Rabboni!" (which means Teacher).
17 Jesus said, "Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet returned to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, 'I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.' "
18 Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: "I have seen the Lord!" And she told them that he had said these things to her.
Although it is not spelled out, there is a suggestion in the Gospel of John that the disciples did not believe Mary Magdalene. Jesus does not appear to the disciples until evening, and they are in the same house, with the door locked. Evidently they did not go to the tomb after Mary described meeting Jesus after the Resurrection.
I wish all of you a blessed Holy Week.
--Elizabeth Fels
Sources:
Chekhov, Anton. The Lady with the Dog and Other Stories, 1896-1904. London: The Penguin Group, 2002.
Coogan, Michael, Ed. The New Oxford Annotated Bible (3rd ed). Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.
Other lectionary passages: Acts 10:34-43; Psalm 18: 1-2, 14-24; 1 Corinthians 15:1-11.
No comments:
Post a Comment